KCR Responsible For Covid-19 Nightmare: Congress

Expressing serious concern over the rapidly rising number of Covid-19 cases and deaths in Telangana, Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) President & Nalgonda MP N Uttam Kumar Reddy alleged that Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao's inefficiency and inability were responsible for the present situation.

He also announced the schedule for a series of agitation programmes to be held in the next one week on this and other issues.

He was addressing a press conference at Gandhi Bhavan on Saturday along with TPCC Working Presidents Ponnam Prabhakar and Kusum Kumar, Vice-President Dr Mallu Ravi, AICC Spokesperson Dr Dasoju Sravan and other leaders.

Uttam Kumar Reddy alleged that the KCR government had failed completely in handling the coronavirus outbreak. He said that the first coronavirus case was reported in Telangana about three months ago, and that experts had issued multiple warnings predicting a huge rise in the number of cases. However even after three months the KCR government had taken no measures to handle the situation in an effective manner.

He said that the guidelines to trace, test and treat Covid-19 patients were not followed, and KCR's negligent and casual approach led to a huge spread of the disease with no medical infrastructure in place to treat the affected persons. The situation was so bad now that there were no beds in the hospitals to treat the Covid-19 patients.

The TPCC chief said that there was still only one Covid-19 hospital (Gandhi Hospital) for the nearly 4 crore people of Telangana. He said that the lockdown period was not utilised properly to upgrade the infrastructure. Consequently, the authorities were today unable to attend to the rising number of Covid-19 cases in the state.

He said that the Congress had been raising the issue of the seriously low number of Covid-19 tests in Telangana. He said that a representation had also been made with the Governor on the issue. Even the High Court had given several suggestions for increasing the testing rate. However the KCR government was not willing to listen to the opposition parties, the Governor or even the High Court.

He also said that the government had failed to provide Personal Protection Equipment (PPE) kits even to the doctors who were treating Covid-19 patients. Consequently, several doctors, nurses and other paramedical staff had gotten infected by the deadly virus. Similarly, several police personnel, sanitation workers and journalists had gotten infected. He said that these cases clearly exposed the inefficiency and failure of the TRS government.

Reddy reiterated the demand that all frontline warriors against the coronavirus including doctors, para-medical staff, policemen, sanitation workers and journalists be paid an ex-gratia of Rs 50 lakh if they died of Covid-19. He said that the Central government had already made an announcement that doctors and paramedics would be given ex-gratia of Rs 50 lakh. However, this decision was not being implemented by the TRS government.

He also demanded Rs 10 lakh as ex-gratia for the poor people who died due to Covid-19.

The TPCC chief said that TPCC Task Force Committee on Covid-19, headed by Marri Shashidhar Reddy, would make a representation to the central team which was visiting Hyderabad, on the negligence of state government in managing the containment zones. He also announced that the Congress leaders would address press meets on June 30 to expose the failures of the TRS government in handling the Covid-19 situation.

Reddy also slammed the TRS government for the inflated electricity bills given to the consumers this month. He demanded that the electricity bills for the lockdown period of two months be waived off, especially for the BPL families. He also demanded that the power companies should adopt telescopic methodology to generate electricity bills by scrapping the non-telescopic method, to benefit the consumers. He said that the Congress would organise protests against the inflated electricity bills with black badges and flags in all mandal headquarters on July 3.

The TPCC also announced that protests would be held on June 29 against the hikes in petrol and diesel prices in all rural district headquarters, and memoranda submitted to the various district Collectors. Similarly, protests would be held in the urban areas and mandal headquarters on July 4.

Reddy said that the Congress would organise the birth centenary celebrations of former Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao from June 28. The celebrations would go on for a year through different programs. He pointed out that the then Congress government of undivided Andhra Pradesh had passed a resolution in the Assembly demanding a Bharat Ratna for P V Narasimha Rao. He said Asia's longest flyover in Hyderabad was also named after PVNR by the Congress government. He said that the party would welcome centenary celebrations for the departed leader by anyone, including the state government.